Playing acoustic with pick?

So I've been playing since December, this is my first guitar and it's a spanish guitar. I usually play with pick, but I've heard that playing acoustic guitar with pick isn't helpful to learn or some thing like that.

So, is there any wrong with playing acoustic using a pick? Should I use my fingers instead? The only difference I find is that the guitar sounds better when played with pick

Also, any good song to practice arpeggios? I gotta master that stuff :P

It is all about your style of playing. Most people that play nylon string guitars use finger picking because it is easier to play the particular styles of music that that are playing. If your style of playing can be done with a pick and you are more comfortable using a pick then there is no good reason not to use one.

Re the Doc. He was also a passable fingerpicker - his early version of Deep River Blues ain't easy, I've been struggling with it for years, on and off.. I have to say though that if anyone puts "acoustic guitar" and "pick" in the same sentence, I think of Tony Rice.

If John McLaughlin can play a nylon string guitar with a pick . . . . . so can you.

Willie Nelson did alright for himself pickin' nylon, too.

My two cents: Learn to play with your fingers; it's important. Learn, too, how to play using a pick. Both are fundamental skills that you will build on for a lifetime. You'll find that there rarely is an "either/or" in music. Pick or fingers, just like "acoustic or electric", is not a one-time choice you make to which you are forever bound. You are perfectly allowed to own and play several each of 6-string acoustics, a 12-string, a bass, an electric or two, a classical... in fact, I highly recommend you do. It all overlaps. Fingers for acoustics and picks for electrics is a common association but hardly written in stone; you may habitually use a pick on a 12-string acoustic, for example.

You just need to watch yourself. It will take years and years, but if you strum a classical guitar with a pick, you might wear a hole in it. That's why steel string acoustics have the teardrop pickguards under the soundhole.

For a nylon string(spanish) guitar, I'd recommend either a very light gage nylon pick or better yet - a felt ukelele pick. Usually classical/spanish guitars are played with fingers(as are ukelele's) but using a pick is no crime IMO.

I suspect it is due to the run he plays at the beginning of the song. Many people find a run like that to be easier with a pick.

I personally doubt it, that run is mostly legato and fairly straightforward to finger pick.

If I had to guess, it would be for the increased attack it gives him. He has a milder finger style attack and tone throughout the piece, but that could of course just be by choice (and some of it assuredly is.) Either way it's interesting.

Most of the time when I finger-pick, it's hybrid picking. I guess one of the older fellas at the jam wasn't familiar with it and commented when he noticed it.I do work on doing it with just my fingers sometimes.

Necroheadbanger Right now, just learn what you like, how you like. Get a few rhythm parts down from some songs you like, learn what's called a pentatonic minor scale, and learn how to play that for every note up the fretboard. If you want, PM me and I'll send you some resources or answer any beginner questions

I have fingernails on my right hand I never use picks. Picking or strumming. They get lost anyway.

Typically, it sounds a LOT louder when you use a pick while playing a normal acoustic. I really wouldn't recommend using anything but picking on a classical guitar though, picks just don't sound good (Unless you aren't strumming with it). It's a lot easier for people to hear you when you use a pick on acoustic though, when doing rythym guitar, like playing off a chord sheet or whatever.

Fingernails are just as good as a picks. You don't have to change mode when switching from strum to fingerpicking midstream which I frequently do. They don't fly out into space or into the soundhole! There are subtle things you can do with fingernails that you can't do with a pick and vice versa.Still, everyone's experience is different and viable, just a matter of personal preference.

Also, any good song to practice arpeggios? I gotta master that stuff :P

You can use arpeggios on almost any song. Just because the original artist, or the artist who had the well-known hit version of a song strummed doesn't mean you can't turn the chords into arpeggios. You might be amazed at the things you'll discover by playing a song the way you want to play it instead of slavishly copying someone else's techniques.

That doesn't mean you'll automatically get great results every time. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. But if you're practicing in order to learn, what the hell? We learn from mistakes as much as we learn from successes.

Someone else bumped the thread so I will say that now I use steel strings and they are awful for fingerpicking.

Like over 99% of all non-classical guitarists use steel string instruments, including fingerpicking. If hundreds of legendary fingerpickers can sound great on a steel string, clearly the problem exists between the guitar and floor. ; )

I'm say that it's you. Get practicing and stuff making trash threads in the Pit and you'll be able to make not awful.

There's no such thing; there never was. Where I am going you cannot follow me now.

Hmm. I'll take a wild guess at 50% of non-classical guitarists using steel string instruments. There's a lot of non-classical nylon string guitarists in Latin America. I lived in Colombia for over two years, and I was surprised at the high proportion of those that play musical instruments.